Suspects sought in Castor Gardens muggings

Phil­adelphia po­lice are try­ing to identi­fy a group of young men who may have been re­spons­ible for three mug­gings in the Castor Gar­dens sec­tion of the North­east last month.

The crimes oc­curred on April 17 and 18 and in­volved four teen­agers or young adults, po­lice said.

On April 17, a Wed­nes­day, at about 9:10 p.m., the four­some ap­proached an un­spe­cified num­ber of vic­tims who were walk­ing along the 6600 block of Rut­land St. The of­fend­ers al­legedly as­saul­ted the vic­tims and at­temp­ted to steal a cell phone from one of them. The at­tack­ers failed to get the phone, however, and fled the area on foot. About 20 minutes later, a group of four males at­tacked a man who was walk­ing on the same block of Rut­land St. The mug­gers took the vic­tim’s cell phone dur­ing the as­sault, then fled the area on foot.

The fol­low­ing even­ing, at about 6:38 p.m., a group of four rob­bers at­tacked a man as he walked along the 6600 block of Souder St., about four blocks from the site of the earli­er crimes. This time, the as­sail­ants as­saul­ted the man, stole $40 cash from his pock­et and fled on foot.

In the first two cases, the rob­bers were de­scribed as four black males, all about 16 years old, all 5 feet 8 inches tall and all with light com­plex­ions. In the second rob­bery, one sus­pect wore a green long-sleeve shirt, an­oth­er wore a white polo-style shirt, an­oth­er wore a gray sweat­shirt and an­oth­er wore a bur­gundy shirt with a yel­low logo.

In the April 18 case, the rob­bers were de­scribed as black males between 17 and 21 years old and ran­ging in height from 5 feet 5 inches to 5 feet 11 inches tall. One wore a blue short-sleeve shirt, while an­oth­er wore a black long-sleeve shirt.

Call 215-686-TIPS or text to PPD TIP to re­port in­form­a­tion about the crimes. ••